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Life Lessons From the Words of Terry Pratchett

We all find inspiration from different sources that surround our everyday lives and as someone that has always harboured a hidden desire to become a writer, how could I write about anything else today after hearing about the sad passing of Sir Terry Pratchett.

In a digital world where the written word is slowly being replaced by the more visually appealing videos on websites and journalists or authors turn their back on writing due to the lack of financial motivation, but a true writer simply does not have a choice and has a simple desire to tell a story in their own natural voice regardless if there is a reward or not.

The prospect of Alzheimer’s disease taking away your own voice and how you communicate in this life is terrifying, but even in the face of adversity, the author filled with greatness that wrote over 70 books remained as philosophical as ever.

If I had been Terry Pratchett the farmer or Terry Pratchett the dentist, nobody would have paid any attention if I had announced I had Alzheimer’s. But there is something fascinating about an author losing the power over words.

There was something about those worlds he created that were full of misfit heroes that struck a real cord with me and there are so many quotes that we all know by heart that will forever inspire writers of all generations such as the line “If you don’t turn your life into a story, you just become a part of someone else’s story” from the Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents.

In his passing we have inherited his beautiful words that will remain long after you and I have left this world, but in the words of the great man “Don’t think of it as dying, just think of it as leaving early to avoid the rush”

Here are just a few of my favourite quotes that have come from the brilliant mind of a great man with a fantastic sense of adventure.

Goodness is about what you do. Not who you pray to

I have no use for people who have learned the limits of the possible

A man’s not dead whilst his name is being mentioned

Pratchett was so much more than just an author of fantasy novels and there are so many life lessons to be found in his words such as the book Moving Pictures that perfectly illustrates what this crazy life is all about.

The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues. —from Moving Pictures

All too often we fail to realise the true effect we have on others in this life and whatever you background or outlook in life, I believe the most powerful line written by Sir Terry Pratchett is “No one is actually dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away…”

Have the words of Terry Pratchett inspired you? I would love to hear your thoughts and favourite quotes.